Myths of Babylonia and Assyria

Page: 198

When the Kassite Dynasty of Babylonia was extinguished, about
1140 B.C., the Amorites were being displaced in Palestine by the
Philistines and the Israelitish tribes; the Aramaeans were
extending their conquests in Syria and Mesopotamia; the Muski
were the overlords of the Hittites; Assyrian power was being
revived at the beginning of the second period of the Old Empire;
and Egypt was governed by a weakly king, Rameses VIII, a puppet
in the hands of the priesthood, who was unable to protect the
rich tombs of the Eighteenth Dynasty Pharaohs against the bands
of professional robbers who were plundering them.

A new dynasty--the Dynasty of Pashe--had arisen at the ancient
Sumerian city of Isin. Its early kings were contemporary with
some of the last Kassite monarchs, and they engaged in conflicts
with the Elamites, who were encroaching steadily upon Babylonian
territory, and were ultimately able to seize the province of
Namar, famous for its horses, which was situated to the east of
Akkad. The Assyrians, under Ashur-dan I, were not only
reconquering lost territory, but invading Babylonia and carrying
off rich plunder. Ashur-dan inflicted a crushing defeat upon the
second-last Kassite ruler.

There years later Nebuchadrezzar I, of the Dynasty of Pashe,
seized the Babylonian throne. He was the most powerful and
distinguished monarch of his line--an accomplished general and a
wise statesman. His name